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Alex Karev
Alex Karev is an attending pediatric surgeon working at Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital. Alex is an eager and competitive surgeon, but he can also be self-absorbed and overconfident. In the early years of his internship, he only wanted to work on cases that he felt were interesting. His offensive behavior and poor attitude caused him to be extremely disliked by doctors and patients alike. This changed after he started working in pediatrics. It is slowly revealed that Alex does care for others and is very kind. He actively plays down his soft side, adopting a brash and cocky attitude to project to other people. Alex married Izzie Stevens, but divorced after she abandoned him. Early Life When Alex was seven, he had to start cleaning up his drunk and drug addict father. At that point, he became he adult of the family as his mother was schizophrenic. Alex described himself as "raised in a bar" and that his father never took him to the park or camping. After Alex's father left, he took care of his mother and his siblings. Alex was in 17 different foster homes in the course of 5 years. He also spent time in juvenile detention for stealing food for his family. He also admitted his mother into a psychiatric facility at one point. Alex lost his virginity to a school nurse when he was 15. At some point, Alex legally changed his last name to Karev, his mother's maiden name, to disassociate himself from his father, James Evans. After Alex's grandmother died, he had a dream where she told him not to play with his parts. He attending college at Iowa State University, where he wrestled. Season 1 Alex started his internship at the same day Meredith, George, Cristina and Izzie did. He was at first assigned to a different resident, named Jeremy, than the other four. On his first day, Meredith saved one of his patients from a post-op complication in front of the chief after Alex dismissed the nurse and Meredith several times. Je joined Miranda Bailey's service later, after his first resident gave him up for unknown reasons. He didn't get along with his colleagues due to his attitude. For example, he would only pick up the good and interesting cases and steal them from his colleagues. After a few weeks, the other interns learned of his softer, more understanding side and they became friends. In the beginning, he told everyone hat his dream specialty was plastic surgery, but after he got to know the specialty closer, he discovered that it wasn't for him. He wanted to go into plastics because most of the time the patients there willingly chose their plan. After a longer stint with Addison Montgomery, he discovered that he liked to work with infants and began to develop a keen interest in neonatal surgery. Season 2 Alex was in the elevator with George when he performed the open heart surgery and saved the person's life. Season 3 Alex rescued Rebecca Pope while she was pregnant during the ferry boat accident. He also helped her pick a "new face" for Sloan to construct. Because of her new face and couldn't remember her real name, Alex nicknamed her Ava. Season 4 Later on, Rebecca returned and they a brief relationship during which she believed he got her pregnant (which was investigated by Izzie and turned out to be false). A bit later, under pressure from Izzie, Ava revealed the truth to Alex. Before she come back to Seattle, Ava had developed a borderline personality disorder. A part of this disorder was that she had forgotten that she already had a baby. Alex took care of Rebecca when she returned to Seattle for the second time. He couldn't prevent her suicide attempt. Alex founder her in Meredith's kitchen and took her to the ER, where she was treated by Izzie. Ozzie pressured Alex to get her admitted to the psych ward. At first, Alex wouldn't allow that and told Izzie that she was "only going through a bad patch," and that he could take care of her. After a long talk with Izzie, Alex admitted that Ava needed help and that he couldn't give it to her. Season 5 Alex and Izzie got married after a tumor was removed from her brain, but a second was found by Derek. Season 6 Izzie made a treatment error that endangered the life of a patient, and she ended up getting fired from the Surgical Program. She believed that her getting fired was partially Alex's fault, so she wrote him a Dear John letter and left Seattle. Then, she returned and attempted to get back together with Alex, but he refused because of the fact that she had abandoned him, and they ultimately got divorced. Season 7 Alex and his fellow fourth year residents began the race for the position of chief resident. Alex initially fell behind in the race because he didn't have any projects to work on while is peers were going off on their own. However, an idea was planted into his head when he joined Robbins in looking at scans of patient in need of surgery. When he asked if he could scrub in, Robbins informed him that the child was in Africa and wouldn't be getting the surgery because she needed to stay to care for her own sick child who was in the NICU at the time. It would cost too much to fly him out herself and she was at a loss as to getting someone who was willing to bring that kid, plus the dozen others, to the US for surgery. Later, when prompted by Owen about his plans for chief resident, Alex impulsively blurted out a plan to bring over a group of African kids for much needed surgeries. From that point, Alex committed himself to the Africa Project, despite a rocky start. He initially presented his plan to Stark, asking for the help and money he needed to get the project off the ground. Stark denied him, however, because despite all of Alex's good intentions, he wasn't good at organizing the logistic part of the project, coming off as disorganized and "half-assed", according to Stark. Resorting to Plan B, Alex went to one of his rich patients, Gladys Pulcher, who was suffering from late stage lung cancer. Pulcher, dubbed "Dragon Lady" by Alex because of her constant cold and mean spirited remarks, refused and threatened to sue him and the hospital. Alex persisted, however, going as far as to show her pictures of the many sick kids before she sent him away. She asked for him later when Lexie was having trouble moving her without causing pain. He refused to help unless she agreed to give him the money for his project. She agreed and Alex walked away victorious. His glee was short-lived as Pulcher coded and died soon after. Despite the financial setback, Alex proceeded with his plans, first charging with credit cards and the giving "I owe you" promises until the children were set to arrive. Frantic and crumbling under the pressure of owing so much money and living up to the expectations he had set up for these kids, Alex nearly had a meltdown. He attempted to run away from the problem, ignoring Lexie who was hounding him about the debt, and instead focusing on helping the kids. However, a check came in the mail just in time from the lawyer handling the estate of Gladys Pulcher, giving Alex two hundred thousand dollars and essentially funding the project. The children arrived and the surgeons of Seattle Grace Mercy West were able to give them their surgeries successful. The project put Alex as the front runner in the race for chief resident. When Meredith was working on Derek's Alzheimer's trial, Alex spotted her walking down the hall with a trial packet under her lab coat. She convinced him not to rat her out for a while, saying "Nothing I did changes anything." However, the race for chief resident was on and when Meredith became a top contestant, Alex told Hunt what he saw her do while drinking at Joe's. Meredith retaliated by kicking Alex out of her house, despite his many apologies. Season 8 When Richard found out that she switched the packets so Adele would receive the active ingredient, he decided to take the fall for her and Meredith was able to keep her job and she eventually forgave Alex. When the residents first began applying for fellowships, Alex was concerned because the interviews Robbins lined up were all at second rate hospitals. However, he soon discovered that Robbins was only doing this to convince him to stay at Seattle Grace Mercy West, and began to get calls from the country's top hospitals. He verbally committed to staying at Seattle Grace Mercy West and being Arizona's fellow. However, after Johns Hopkins created a fellowship spot just for him, he decided to take that spot, angering Arizona and leading her to take his spot on the plane that ultimately crashed. His guilt over her replacing him led him to agree to stay in Seattle while she recovered, even amputating her leg himself when the time came. After delaying his move to Johns Hopkins for months, he eventually decided to stay in Seattle and take Arizona's fellowship. Season 9 The African project was temporarily threatened when a new doctor, Mel Barnett, took over for Robbins while she recovered after the plane crash and her amputation. According to Barnett, the project didn't fit in his agenda for pediatrics and would have been shipped over to a different hospital. This didn't happen as Alex stayed in Seattle inserted of going to Baltimore to do his fellowship at Johns Hopkins. Season 10 Alex left Grey Sloan Memorial temporarily to join a private practice with Oliver Lebackes for the purpose of making enough money to pay off his medical school debts. Alex didn't have an easy relationship with his father, James Evans. James abused Alex, his mother, and his siblings when they were young. James struggled all his life with a drug and alcohol addiction. At 15, Alex stood up to his father, beat him up, and threw him out of the house. Alex later admitted to a patient that he had gone too far. Years later, Alex met his father again at Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital after James was admitted to the ER. James and two of his friends were in a car crash and they were obviously on some drugs. It is later confirmed that the drug of his choice is heroin. After Alex recognized his father, he couldn't find the courage to speak with him in the hospital. After James was discharged, Alex tracked him down in a bar, but still could't fin the courage to talk to him at the same night. Alex visited the bar a night after his initial visit and after a few drinks, he got into a fight with his father once again. After that fight, James recognized Alex as his son. He said he recognized Alex because of his angry eyes, which were the same when Alex was 15. After that incident, Alex left James for good. A while later, James came back to the hospital after quitting the drugs. He said to Jo that he wanted to get clean for his family. At first, Alex declined to help him. After a while and a little push from Jo, Alex made up his mind and at least tried to help and talk to his dad. After Shane froze while operating on James' heart, Alex was angry at Shane and tried to make his dad happy. He even went so far to lie on James' second ex-wife to get her to visit James. When James died, Alex was relieved and sad at the same time. Shane tried to apologize to Alex, but he was still angry at him and Alex beat him up in front of Meredith, Cristina, and Jo. Alex only stopped because Meredith held him back. Alex and Jo begin dating after them both denying their feelings for each other. Jo and Alex fight over his father, but Alex realizes Jo was doing it because she loved him. They both were in foster care growing up. Alex proposes although Jo does not realize that that's what he was doing until he introduces her as his fiancee. When the board introduces the no fraternization rule, they fake a break up. Meredith finds a solution in a love contract, which they both have to sign, which states that their relationship is consensual. Season 11 When Maggie accidentally revealed in the OR that Alex was looking for a spot on the board, Lebackes fired him on the spot. Even though he didn't get the spot, the hospital hired him back as an attending peds surgeon. Season 12 Alex proposed to Jo, but she said no. After getting the impressions, Alex starts beating Andrew when he thinks him and Jo were messing around. Season 13 Personality Relationships Career Trivia Notable Episodes Appearances